This invention relates to telephone systems and, in particular, to telephone systems for providing enhanced services to telephone system customers.
In modern day telephone systems, customers of the system may often rent or lease from the telephone system operator or company telephone facilities for use by the customer. The customer may also employ at its location or premises customer provided telephone facilities. The aforesaid leased and customer provided telephone facilities are usually for the exclusive use of the customer and are referred to as herein as customer facilities. The other telephone facilities of the telephone company, which form the predominate part of the telephone system and are used generally for all customers, are referred to herein as company facilities.
Customer facilities may comprise a variety of facility types including trunk lines, multi-line groups, network access registers, single customer lines, customer consoles and any other types of telephone facilities offered by the telephone company or useable in the telephone system. Since the customer facilities of a customer may be extensive, the customer often desires information as to their usage. This so-called "traffic data" can be used by the customer to assess how efficiently its telephone facilities are operating, so that the customer can then determine whether there is a need to reduce, expand or modify the facilities. Traffic data is also used by the customer to assess the grade and level of service that the customer is providing to its clients and end-users.
Various procedures have been employed in the past to provide a customer with traffic data associated with its customer facilities. One procedure is to provide a dedicated line between the customer and the central office serving the customer. The central office switch is then provided with appropriate registers adapted to accumulate preselected traffic data of certain customer facilities as determined by the customer. The accumulated customer traffic data is then communicated over the dedicated line to the customer. Other procedures involve recording the customer traffic data on magnetic tape or on paper which is then delivered from the central office to the customer. In each of these cases, the customer traffic data supplied has been limited to that of customer facilities associated with the single switch of the central office serving the customer.
Since the above procedures involve conveying of customer traffic data from a central office to each customer directly, it is costly for the telephone company to provide. This, in turn, increases the cost of the service to the customer, thereby, limiting the number of customers who can avail themselves of the service.
Another procedure which has been followed in the past by customers to obtain customer traffic data is to request the telephone company to engage in a traffic study of the customer facilities over a limited period of time, usually a week. This study is normally conducted by the telephone company using one of its existing centralized Engineering and Administration Data Acquisition Systems (EADASs) connected to the central office serving the customer requesting the study. A telephone company usually deploys one or more EADASs throughout the region served by its telephone system. Each EADAS is associated with a group of central offices in the telephone system and periodically (e.g., every 30 minutes) gathers information and traffic data related to the company facilities serving the group of central offices. This information and company traffic data is then used internally by the telephone company for operation of the telephone system.
The various types of electronic central office switches in use today include registers which can be specifically assigned to accumulate the traffic data associated with the telephone facilities serving the switches. This traffic data is identified by each switch in terms of so-called "Sections" each corresponding to a predetermined or preselected traffic data category. Each specific Section has a Section Number and Keyword for identifying and accessing the traffic data files of the associated traffic data category.
When a traffic study is requested by a customer, telephone company personnel assign registers in the central office switch serving the customer to accumulate the desired traffic data of the customer facilities in the same manner as registers are assigned to accumulate the company traffic data. The customer traffic data is also identified in the same manner as the company traffic data under the appropriate Section Number and Keyword file and is sent to the EADAS. At the EADAS, the customer traffic data for the period requested is then assimilated and retrieved from the received traffic data files and a report prepared to communicate the results of the study to the customer.
As can be appreciated, while the above procedure of requesting a traffic study can be worthwhile for a customer, it can also be costly, since it requires a specific request and a specific study to be made by the telephone company. Additionally, the study is confined to a specific time period and does not allow customers to receive directed, on-line traffic data at their premises.
It is, therefore, an object of the present invention to provide a telephone system in which customer traffic data is made more readily and easily available to a customer.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a telephone system in which customer traffic data is made available to a customer in an efficient manner using to the extent possible existing components of the telephone system.
It is yet a further object of the present invention to provide a telephone system in which customer traffic data is made available to a customer from a plurality of different types of central office switches, with a common output specification.